when time moves forward
by bethanyyerinn
Summary: the surface world is not all sans expected, but with frisk by his side, everything should turn out fine. (if you are looking for happiness, this fic is going to give you a bad time.)
**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

 **Post pacifist with genocide spoilers.**

 **Sans tickles my funny bone.**

 **He also tickles the darkest bones in my being.**

 **This is the culmination of these two sensations in one piece.**

 **Also, when I did this in Word it had different fonts to show dialogue changes, but fanfic doesn't have comic sans, papyrus, or 8bitoperator fonts. It also got rid of my line breaks so, unfortunately, they are gone. Formatting on this site sucks but everything should still be clear. If you want to see it with all the formatting, it's on Archive of our Own under the same penname and title.**

* * *

* time doesn't move forward.

* it doesn't even move backward.

* time exists but cannot be watched - well, not by anyone but me that is.

* me and frisk.

* when i met frisk, i realized i wasn't the only one anymore.

* the only one that could move outside of reality, the only one that watched death be undone.

* i knew frisk was special the way i was special and i thought maybe, just maybe, we could understand the world together.

* while everyone else let time pass them by, frisk and i could exist inside it, outside it, through it…

* without it.

* frisk gave me hope.

* frisk loved people, frisk went out of their way to perform acts of kindness.

* frisk knew that time meant nothing, knew that everything they'd made could be unmade with

* one

* small

* mistake

* but still they did what they could.

* frisk gave me hope.

* i'd given up on going up to the surface until frisk reminded me what it was like to care what happened next

* sure, plots could be unraveled, but maybe i was lucky.

* maybe frisk and i saw more of the world than others and that was a good thing.

* maybe we were the lucky ones.

* i didn't know how wrong i could be.

* we made it to the surface and i got to be with my brother, be with my friends, and i almost dared to become attached to it all.

* underneath i was always afraid it would all be ripped away, that the memories would become ghostly imprints, one i could never prove even existed outside my own mind, but at least i knew frisk was there.

* frisk knew.

* frisk and i would look at each other some days and i knew what they were thinking.

* they knew what i was thinking.

* we remembered when time went in circles and were only relieved that it now stayed in its place.

* i didn't realize then, but…

* i was going to have a bad time.

* me, frisk, and papyrus were out one day for lunch.

* there was this place that i liked to eat.

* it had spaghetti for papyrus, and it had burgers for me.

* the burgers were almost as good as grillby's.

* well, they were close enough, at least, and after years and years you forget what the old stuff was like and just accept the new.

* papyrus was in the bathroom.

* or as papyrus called it, the mirror room – since he definitely didn't go in there for the toilets.

* toriel called frisk.

* frisk needed to go home.

* i didn't think to ask why.

* frisk stood.

* i told frisk that i would ketchup with them later and frisk gave me that smile.

* that smile that meant they were remembering something that nobody else remembered and i smiled too.

* i was always smiling, of course, but that baring of teeth was different than this – this true happiness that i felt at knowing frisk understood.

* frisk was the flesh to my bone

* the whisper to my shout

* the passion to my apathy

* monsters and humans weren't all that different in the end

* but i was neither unless frisk was there to remind me what it meant to be both.

* i felt it.

* when it happened, i knew.

* i didn't teleport much up here, because it was hard enough to be a monster in a world full of humans, but i felt it and i had to get there.

* the car was an accordion bleeding oil

* the driver couldn't be seen from where i stood

* but i could feel where they were so i ran

* i found them

* i told them weakly that they ate too much ketchup and it was getting everywhere

 _* Listen, Sans._

 _* Time isn't the same here._

* i wasn't sure what they meant.

* but their eyes were closing and there was no time to ask.

* i told them i'd see them soon.

* they opened their mouth to tell me something.

* i told them not to worry about it.

* they could tell me when they got back.

 _* No, Sans, lis…_

 _* Li…_

* they were gone.

* but i didn't let myself get worked up.

* sure, everything was about to disappear and restart, but at least frisk would remember.

* frisk would remember getting their driver's license and going to the diner and sure, we'd have to start over, but it would be okay.

* how far back would we go?

* now that i thought about it, the last save was ages ago.

* it's not like there was much saving up here.

* wasn't the last save down in asgore's castle?

* i was probably waiting for frisk to say they're last goodbyes and we were going to go through the portal again.

* and hey, that was a nice view, that moment when we got out of the underground.

* maybe it would be nice to see it again.

* sure, that was a lot of time we were going to have to make up, more than ever before, but…

* but…

* it usually didn't take this long.

* usually frisk was gone and then everything went black and then they were back at the last save.

* i should've already been back in the underground.

* it occurred to me that save files might be different here.

* maybe the body stayed, as morbid as that was, and frisk could be found at the last place they had been.

* the diner.

* i flashed back, but the diner was still frisk-less.

* papyrus was still checking himself out in the mirror, which made sense.

* it always took a while.

* i flashed back to the accident and frisk was still there, red and limp.

* time isn't the same here.

* it took me that long to register that frisk had been trying to tell me something important.

* time isn't the same here.

* i was supposed to be at the last save point.

* time isn't the same here.

* the last save point was in the underground

* time isn't the same here

* but frisk said it

* time isn't the same here

* frisk was trying

* time isn't the same here

* was trying to tell me

* time isn't the same here

* frisk said one thing

* time isn't the same

* but they meant something different

* time isn't the

* frisk said the word time

* time isn't

* frisk didn't mean

* time

* death.

* death isn't the same here.

* when frisk died up here…

* it was like when monsters died down there.

* determination did not create resurrection up on this horrible surface nightmare.

* frisk's flesh could be undone here

* and when it was unmade…

* it was not remade.

* it was just…

* gone.

* it seemed cruel that frisk didn't turn to dust and i had to stare at them, watch them not be able to watch me, see closed eyes that weren't asleep, and know that

* time is not the same here.

* i had hated time for being fickle.

* i had hated knowing too much.

* and i think i had wished upon a light in waterfall that when i came up here…

* things would be different.

* i had wished that.

* i didn't specify my meaning.

* i didn't say that i wanted to blissfully forget death like the others.

* i just said i wanted something different.

* this was something different.

* the flesh withered from my bones

* the whisper was overshadowed by the shout

* the apathy swallowed the passion

* i was back at the diner

* papyrus was back at the table

WHERE HAS FRISK GONE?

* where had frisk gone, papyrus asked.

* this world stole them away, i should have said.

* this world was disgusting.

* this world was vile.

* it mocked me because it was a beautiful day outside.

* birds were singing, flowers were blooming…

* on days like these, humans…

BROTHER, ARE YOU WELL?

YOUR EYE…

* **should be burning in hell**

* * *

 **I plan to write more Undertale. Next time with fluff and sex and happy times. I just had to get this out of my system.**

 **If you can, please review. Thanks in advance.**


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